You can walk around the Christmas market with your warm and delicious Chimney cake: milk bread grilled over open fire. You can pick a flavour too: cinnamon, almond, walnut, coconut, etc. There are lots of yummy versions of Kurtoskalacs. If you plan your Budapest holiday for the festive season, don’t miss out the Guided Christmas Market Tours, where you can also taste the real Chimney Cake!

Chimney Cake at Christmas Market Budapest

It is sold at a more expensive price at the market (as all foods and drinks), but considering that there is no entrance fee to the Christmas market, it is not so pricey after all (about 4 Euros per roll, which could be 1-2 Euros otherwise…). So we shut our eyes, and roll with the Christmas: we love to nibble a freshly baked Chimney cake on one of the Budapest Christmas Markets, and have our mulled wine too!

The dough is basically a sort of milk loaf baked and rolled in cinnamon, cocoa powder, etc. Once the dough has raised and is ready to bake, it is thinly stretched by a rolling pin, cut in slightly to make a snake like strip of the dilapidated dough, then quickly rolled on a thicker wooden rolling pin, which has a metal handle and a metal hook. The dough on the pin is then baked in an open fire over the glistening coals. Once the cake is baked, and has a nice brown coating, it is slipped off the thick wooden rolls. The cake looks like a little barbecued pipe, or the chimney stack of old times. Hence the name Chimney Cake (Kürtős kalács in Hungarian).

The cake roll gets its final flavors when it is rolled in the sugary mixtures of cinnamon, cocoa, ginger, etc. The rolls are sold in packages too. It won’t be as delicious if eaten later, and delivered in a plastic wrapping, but it could be one of your Hungarian culinary gifts – some food for thought.

About

Budapest Market Hall is an independent market hall guide for tourists in Budapest, Hungary.
Most major market halls, including the Central Market Hall in Budapest is managed by CSAPI, the Market Management Department of Budapest Municipality (csapi.hu)